Tuesday, February 21, 2012

Ombre Cardigan

Part of the reason that I posted so little throughout January was because I was participating in the Tanis Fiber Arts January knitalong. I ended up being pretty monogamous with it, since I chose such an ambitious project. Toward the end of the month, I was starting to worry I might not finish it before the deadline, but fortunately I had the 31st off from work, so I had time to knit the last of it, weave in ends, and block it, just in time.

Tanis' Ombre cardigan is lovely and featherlight. Being made from two strands of laceweight yarn means the fabric is barely there. Being made from Tanis' Pink Label laceweight means it is also soft and warm and beautiful. The hardest part might have been choosing which of her two colourways to use.

I ended up going with two shades of grey: Shadow and Stormy. Turns out that the Stormy is actually teal as much as it is grey, which of course works for me, since varying shades of teal are mainstays of my wardrobe. The two yarns work well together and have a lot of contrast, which was of course my intention.

The first thing I did when I started knitting the cardi was to widen the seed stitch button band - in the original pattern it is only six stitches wide, which I thought would be a bit too narrow for my cardi. I decided to widen it a bit, in proportion with the increased bust measurement, and ended up doing ten stitches instead of six. The knitting was simple and meditative until I joined at the underarm and realized that the armholes were about 6 inches too big. I ripped it back and rethought the math and ended up with a better size. Once I'd made one modification, well... I decided to do a bit of shaping in the body and made four darts beneath the bust to give it some definition. Then I did some increases beneath the waist for my hips. Finally, I did a few more increases before the ribbing at the hem, since I like ribbing that isn't all stretched out.

The sleeves were easy after that, and then with a quick blocking and some perfect buttons, I have a lovely light cardi. Now I'm just waiting for the weather to warm up a bit so I can start wearing it more.

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About Me

Living life somewhere in the grey area between Liz Lemon and Nancy Botwin. I live with my beloved Heterosexual Life Mate (HLM), no kids, two beautiful feline ladies, and what I can only assume are self-replenishing stacks of fabric and yarn.
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